


Let's Not and Say We Did

by Fictionista654



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Dean Winchester Has Mental Health Issues, Dean runs a motel, Depressed Dean Winchester, Depression, F/F, It's called The Winchester because I'm very creative, Jo's also a writer, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Off-Screen Suicide Attempt, Suicide Attempt, Writer Dean Winchester
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-09
Updated: 2021-02-25
Packaged: 2021-03-12 21:47:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28642455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fictionista654/pseuds/Fictionista654
Summary: After a scandal blows up his career, Dean Winchester vows never to write a book again. Instead, he hunkers down at his dead dad's motel, where he tries to run the place as best he can. Things aren't going too well, and Dean's just about ready to drink himself into an early grave when a handsome stranger blows into town, a stranger who seems to know Dean better than he knows himself.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester, Charlie Bradbury/Jo Harvelle, Kaia Nieves/Claire Novak
Comments: 4
Kudos: 26





	1. Chapter 1

Dean wakes up with a searing headache and a mouth drier than the Sa-fucking-hara. He groans into his pillow, his shoulders bunching up around his ears. Then, with one eye, he peeps out at his surroundings. Another groan immediately follows. He doesn’t want to be here in this shitty motel room with the yellowing exposed radiator and the peeling wallpaper and the bedsheets that smell like cigarette smoke.

Not that Dean has done anything to pretty the place up. No, he’s done his damned best to wreck it. A leaking bottle of whiskey lies on its side on the ragged carpeting, and the TV screen is cracked where he put his fist through it last night. Not one of his proudest moments. The nightstand is burned where he put out his joint.

A tidal wave of misery sweeps through him, and he falls back onto his bed, his eyes burning. There’s no point to getting out of it today. Garth will take care of the front desk, not that they’ve had many customers these past few months. The Winchester is on its last legs, and Dean can’t really find it in himself to care. It may be the family business, but he doesn’t have the energy to feel anything about it except depressed.

His computer is open on the desk, and he gives it the finger. Fucking stupid piece of crap. It died on him last night right in the middle of some drunken ramblings, and he almost threw it across the room. He can’t quite remember why he didn’t.

God, his entire body hurts. How much did he drink last night? Too much. What would Sammy say?

No. He’s not going to think about his little brother. Not now, not when he’s such a miserable sack of shit.

With a sudden impulsive movement, Dean throws his covers to the floor and shivers in the cold air. Room 101 isn’t heated. Not that Dean deserves heat. Really, he deserves a tent out in the pouring rain. He deserves a cardboard box in an alleyway. He deserves—

He stops himself before he ends up deciding that where he _really_ belongs is the middle of the interstate. Instead, he gets up, his head spinning. A moment later, he’s on his knees, retching up a pool of bitter liquid. He watches dispassionately as it soaks into the carpet.

When he pushes himself to his feet, his knees shake, and he nearly goes down again. He has to hold onto the wall for balance. The room spins around him like a goddamn carousel. All he needs is some tinkling music and a pony.

Outside, rain splatters the pavement. He leans against the threshold of his motel room and watches it come down. The clouds are furrowed together like brows, like the sky itself is frowning.

Huh. Maybe he should write that down. Or maybe it’s trite nonsense. He doesn’t quite know. It’s probably nonsense. Isn’t that all he’s good for?

A memory tries to shove its way to the fore of Dean’s brain, but he batters it back with a mental stick.

The walk to the office is short, but by the time Dean pushes open the door, making the bell jingle, he’s sopping. Garth, sitting behind the register, raises an eyebrow.

“Wow, man. You look like you just took a shower with your clothes on.”

“Heh,” Dean says humorlessly. He rubs his mouth with the back of his hand, then digs into the corners of his eyes for the crusted sleep. Disgusting. “Anyone come in last night?”

Garth shakes his head. “It was pretty slow. The lady in 104 checked out.”

“So we’re all vacancies,” says Dean. “Great.” He shuffles to the coffee maker in the corner and punches at the buttons. It’s a ridiculous expense, but one that Sam insisted on the last time he spent the summer here. _The customers will like it, Dean._

The hot, brown liquid trickles out into a styrofoam cup, and Dean guzzles it down, ignoring the way it sears the inside of his throat. He deserves the pain, right? Isn’t that what he just decided?

“So…I can go?” Garth says hopefully.

Shit. “Yeah,” Dean says tiredly. “Get out of here.” Garth is gone faster than the Human Torch.

Still in the clothes he wore yesterday, Dean sits behind the counter and turns on the ancient computer. Maybe he can watch some porn or something.

 _Gross, Dean,_ Sammy’s voice says in his head.

Fine. Maybe not porn.

_Don’t Google yourself. Don’t Google yourself._

Dean Googles himself. Well, not himself. His pen name. Dean Campbell. He skims the results, then closes the tab. His hands are shaking. He doesn’t really know what he expected.

Fuck. It’s too early for this. It’s only…11:15. Basically dawn.

The phone rings, making Dean jump. He picks it up warily. “The Winchester, how can I help you?”

“Dean, it’s me.”

Oh. Dean’s stomach drops, and he swivels around in his chair to stare at the door that leads into the kitchen area. He does not want to have this conversation right now. In fact, he’d do pretty much anything to avoid it.

So he does the only reasonable thing, and hangs up. A moment later, it rings again. This time, Dean doesn’t touch it. The phone finally falls silent before ringing again. Then, thank the Lord, it finally stops.

Great. Good.

Then, warily, Dean opens the password-protected folder on the desktop. He surveys the kingdom of word documents within, each of them filled with complete and utter crap. He opens one up at random and skims the first few lines— _”Vampires,” Claire said skeptically. Alex nodded and took a swig of her pop. “Honest-to-God.”—_ and cringes. What is he thinking, writing a goddamn children’s book?

The bell over the door tinkles, and Dean looks up. It’s just Jo, her blond hair plastered to her head. She grins at him, her hands shoved deep in her pockets.

“Hey there, cowboy.”

Dean manages to find a smile for her. “What’s up, Jo?”

She shrugs as she ambles up to the desk. “Not much. Thought I’d come from down the road, see how you’re holding up in the storm. We lost power.”

“No shit,” says Dean, glancing nervously at the lightbulb.

“Phone lines, too.” She plants her elbows on the counter. “So, how are you?”

Dean purses his lips. “Your Mom put you up to this?”

Jo rolls her eyes. “Guilty as charged.”

“You tell Ellen I’m peachy,” Dean says shortly. There’s a slight pause. He likes Jo and Ellen, might even say he loves them, but they have an annoying habit of checking in on him. He doesn’t know how to convince them that he’s really, no, really doing just fine.

Without answering, Jo opens the door to the kitchen and props it open with the doorstop so she can talk to him as she pours herself a bowl of cereal.

“Mom wants to let you know that you’re welcome at dinner tonight.” She pauses, lets him think on that. “Bobby’ll be there.”

Great. As if he needs more concerned adults looking over his shoulder. They’re gonna eye him for cracks, make sure poor little Dean isn’t breaking down over his daddy’s death. No thank you.

“I’m good,” he tells her.

“Let me guess,” says Jo. “Cup O’Noodles and a skin flick?” Dean gives her a thumbs up, and Jo shakes her head, putting down the milk. “Sad, Dean.”

“Look,” he says, propping one of his heels against the wall, “you can’t just walk in here and criticize me. That’s not how this works.”

Jo cocks her head. “And how does this work?”

“Fuck if I know,” Dean says, suddenly tired. He likes Jo, but right now he wants nothing more than for her to disappear. He needs some time to himself, and not in that way. It’s just, his thoughts are so loud that he can’t hear anything but them. Ain’t nothing gonna change that.

He can see something in Jo’s eyes, and maybe it’s empathy, and maybe it’s pity, but Dean suddenly can’t take it. Abruptly, he swivels his chair around and pulls up the guest log on the computer. He scrolls through it without looking at the names, trying to give off the best I’m busy vibe that he can.

Taking her cereal with her, Jo comes to look at the computer screen over his shoulder. “Watcha doing?”

“Stuff,” Dean grunts. Jo doesn’t take the hint.

“Anything I can help with?”

Dean clicks out of the guest log. Right onto the Claire document. For a moment, adrenaline floods his body. His pupils dilate, letting in more light. It takes him three times to close out of it.

“Dean?” says Jo, and, shit, Dean can see the light come on in her eyes. “Was that a word document?”

“Nope.” Dean powers off the computer and pushes the keyboard away from himself for good measure. “Absolutely not.”

“You’re writing again,” Jo says, and her voice is soft. Dean flinches.

His voice is rough when he speaks. “No,” he tells her. “I’m not. I’m just passing the time.”

“You can’t fool me, Dean Winchester.” Jo goes back into the kitchen and picks up her cereal. “I know you like the back of my hand.”

“How well do you know the back of your hand?” Dean grumbles. “Because I sure as shit don’t know the back of mine.” He points at her. “Don’t tell Ellen about this.”

For once, Jo looks serious when she says, “Cross my heart.” She pauses a moment, pushes her spoon around. “You know, I’ve been writing, too.”

It’s one of the things that used to bring Dean and Jo together. They’d show each other their work, help each other along. But that was a long time ago. Still, Dean’s happy for her. He’s the one who doesn’t deserve to write a book ever again, not Jo. He almost asks to see her manuscript, but then she’ll want to see his, and Dean’s not up for a game of I’ll-show-you-mine-if-you-show-me-yours.

Jo’s cheeks are a little pink, now. Dean knows that she gets embarrassed talking about her own work, too. Hell, she probably didn’t want to tell him. But she’s willing to make sacrifices to get Dean out of his dark place. He doesn’t deserve her.

“I’ve been sending short stories out to magazines,” she says, her voice shy.

“That’s great, Jo,” Dean says, meaning it. “Look at you, Didion.”

She shrugs, dumps her bowl in the sink. “Doubt anything’ll come of it, but, you know, you miss one-hundred percent of the shots you don’t take and all that.”

“And all that,” Dean agrees. “You leaving that cereal for me to clean up?”

“You know it,” says Jo as she walks past him. She goes to the door, then stops, turning to look at him one last time. “Dinner?”

“Maybe,” Dean says. Jo must know it’s the best she’s going to get, because she salutes him and heads off, the door slapping shut behind her.

Dean sighs and drops his head into his hands. He can’t believe that he left his document open. How stupid can he get? It’s like he wants people finding out. And he doesn’t. He absolutely doesn’t.

He should have dropped this stupid author dream long ago. He isn’t built to be a writer. For one thing, he has balls. Real men don’t sit around writing books about teenage girls.

His eyes sting, and he realizes that he’s dangerously near tears. Unacceptable. He stares at the blank computer screen and his reflection stares back. With his jaw set like that, he looks hard. Mean.

“Jesus,” Dean mutters. “I need to get over myself.” He scratches the inside of his wrist, which has begun to itch something awful. His fingers bump over the scar tissue there, and he shudders.

That, at least, will never happen again.


	2. Chapter 2

It’s not that Dean thinks he’s in perfect fucking health or some shit like that. Look, he knows he’s in bad shape. He’s not an idiot. You can’t keep going the way he’s going and not scratch your paint. His days blend into each other, a continual mass of sitting at the front desk and drinking in the motel rooms and staring at blank word documents. His eyes burn continually, and he thinks that he may be developing some sort of ulcer from all the black coffee he drinks.

Luckily, Garth isn’t the most observant person in the world. Dean could come into work with his whole body on fire, and Garth would just nod and say, “Huh.” So Dean’s completely fine on that front. 

Unfortunately, Jo notices a little more than Garth does, and Ellen sends her over nearly every day. Sometimes she’ll even come between classes at the community college, a coffee in one hand. Jo’s smart, real smart, and Dean knows that her mom wants her to go for a scholarship at a four year school. But Jo doesn’t want to leave her mother running the bar all by herself.

Dean can relate to that loyalty between a child and her parent. After all, isn’t that what he’s doing at The Winchester six months after John Winchester’s dead and buried? 

There used to be the calls from Sam, but those have all but stopped since the funeral. Sammy’s gotten tired of checking up on his deadbeat older brother, and Dean can’t blame him.

Not that Dean was always a deadbeat. Time was, he was pretty successful. But with his money near gone on John’s hospital bills, he’s fallen into disrepair. Every now and then he gets an email from his editor, asking him how that book of his is coming along. Dean sends those emails straight to trash.

He wishes that the book would leave him alone, to be honest. But thoughts of it pop into his head on the regular, making it impossible to forget. The rest of his books were all adult fare, pulpy monster-of-the-week shit with plenty of blood, guts, and sex. But there’s something more tender about the book he has in mind this time, and that scares him.

When he’s not drinking in a motel room or sitting at the front desk, he spends some time out on the front porch just staring out at the highway that cuts straight past The Winchester. Not many cars come through, but when they do he always tenses, waiting to see if they’ll pull up. They almost never do. Harvelle is a town in the middle of nowhere, despite Jo’s great-granddaddy’s dream that it would become a bustling metropolis. You need a little more water for that, and Harvelle is as landlocked as they come.

Dean kicks at the ground to get the porch swing swinging and takes a sip of his beer. He’s not dressed warmly enough, though his military jacket does its fair share of work cutting back the wind. There’s a small hole in the knee of his jeans, and he picks at it desultorily. He’s tired, damnit, tired of everything he has falling apart.

“Dean!” The voice carries over the small parking lot, and Dean glances up. It’s Jo, of course, wrapped up in her own military jacket. She’s holding the perennial coffee, and she grins at him as she sits down next to him. Her blond hair is tied out of her face with a braid, but she yanks out the ponytail holder and shakes it out. “Giving me a headache,” she explains.

Sighing, Dean settles against the back of the porch swing. “How was class, Jo?”

She makes a face. “Same old, same old. I guess—” She cuts herself off, shakes her head. “Never mind.”

Well, that’s got Dean’s interest. Not looking at her, he takes another sips of his beer. Let’s the silence percolate. Jo sighs, stretches out her legs. Neither of them speaks. 

“Really, it’s nothing,” she says, and damned if that doesn’t make Dean twice as interested.

“Boy troubles?” he says at last, going off the pink tinge to her cheeks.

Jo glances at him, and now she looks amused. “Right. Boy troubles.” She glances over at the main office, where the glass front door’s propped open with a rock. “You need help in there?”

Dean shakes his head. “Nah, I’ve got it covered. Doubt anyone’s even gonna check in.”

She makes a face. “Business slow?”

“As treacle.” Dean leans his head against the back of the chair and looks up at the sky. Overcast, again. Might even rain for the third day in a row. There’s a chill in the air, and Jo must feel it too because she wraps her arms around herself and shivers.

“You head home,” Dean tells her. “Warm up.”

She shrugs and picks at the end of her flannel sleeve. “Maybe,” she says, but she doesn’t move. Dean can feel the words she wants to say hanging between them, but he doesn’t push it. No, he just stays quiet and sips at his beer and waits for her to talk.

And she almost does, too—he can see her lips parting—when his phone rings. He goes to switch it off, but Jo shakes her head.

“You should answer it.”

He almost doesn’t, but then he sees the caller ID. His stomach flips. _No way._ It’s Sammy.

So, fingers practically shaking, he answers it.

“‘Lo?” he says, keeping his voice steady.

“Dean, hi.” The sound of traffic threads through Sam’s voice. “I have a question.”

Dean glances at Jo, who’s watching curiously. “Shoot.”

“Do you know where Dad put our birth certificates?”

Dean actually knows the answer to this question, but he wants to keep Sam on the phone. “I thought you had one of those for college.”

“I had a copy, but I need the real thing.” Sam sounds tired, like maybe he’s pulled a few all-nighters in the library. Wouldn’t be the first time.

“It’s up at the house,” Dean says, and maybe he sounds a little tired himself. “In the filing cabinet in the office. You, uh, gonna come get it?”

Sam sighs. “Actually, I was going to ask you to mail it.”

Oh. Right. Mail.

“I need your address.”

Sam gives it to him. Then, with a note of relief in his voice, he says bye and hangs up, leaving Dean with dead air.

“Family troubles?” says Jo, her gaze steady on his face. Dean jerks his shoulder.

“Eh. You know how it is.” He puts his cell back in his jacket pocket. “So, you were saying?”

But the moment’s gone. Jo stands, dusting off her jeans. “I’ll take the front desk. You look like hell, Dean. Take a nap.”

He protests, but she’s already striding into the office. And judging by that full backpack she’s got hanging off her shoulder, she probably has enough homework to keep her company for some time. He might as well do as she says and catch some shut-eye.

Room 101 is freezing, as usual, and Dean gets under the covers with his clothes on. His heart hangs heavy in his chest, and his stomach aches. Beneath the covers, he begins to shake. He doesn’t know what the hell is wrong with him, why he can’t hold it together for more than a few hours at a time. All he can do is cling to his pillow and try to pretend that the world isn’t eating him alive.

There’s the sound of a car pulling up, and Dean tries to angle himself to look through the window. But from his prone position, he can’t see much, and he doesn’t much feel like sitting up. Shit like that takes too much energy.

There’s the sound of a car door slamming, and Dean groans, running his hand over his face. He wonders if Jo has the computer password. He supposes that she knows where to find him if she doesn’t.

His gaze falls on his laptop, sitting on the night table, and he reaches for it half-heartedly. His hand skims the surface before falling limply off the side. He barely has the energy to retract his arm, let alone write anything.

Within his head, his own voice mocks him. _How are you ever gonna be a writer if you don’t ever write, Dean? Give me a break._

Really, Dean should jettison the whole writing idea. Who does he think he is? Maybe it worked for a few years, but those halcyon days are long gone. And Dean doesn’t know who he was fooling, anyway. Certainly not the literary world. Assholes like Crowley always knew how to put him in his place.

Sure, it’s hard to be Dean right now. But there are plenty of worse people to be. Hell, he could be in jail right now, or in the fucking army. He’s just a fucking pansy who thinks that writing is hard work. He stares at the stained wallpaper and tries not to cry, which would only complete his humiliation. 

***

That night, Dean feeds himself cold pizza from the fridge in the office. He needs to get a microwave one of these days. There’s one up at the house, but Dean hasn’t been there since…well. He can’t go back right now. He just can’t.

Then he remembers Sammy’s request with a wince. At some point, he’ll have to head up the hill to the house, unearth the stupid document from the stupid filing cabinet. And then he’ll have to find an envelope and a stamp, and then he’ll have to take it to the post office…

The thought exhausts him, and he feels a spark of anger. Why can’t Sammy just come back? Then again, he doesn’t know how hard it is for Dean to go to the house. No one knows, not even Jo, and she knows more about Dean than just about anybody alive. She was the first person he told when he started to write, the first person he told when he started sending shit out.

But she can’t know about how screwed up Dean is. Nobody can know. If anyone finds out what he tried to do to himself, they’ll never leave him alone again. And he needs to be left alone. Needs to figure shit out on his own time, in his own way. He can’t have people looking over his shoulder at every hour of the day, always worried he’s going to do something.

Anyway, he won’t do that again. He knows better than that now. He might be a fuck up, but he won’t let himself get that bad ever again. He’s got to stick around.

 _Why?_ says that voice in his head. _Who would even care if you were gone?_

But thoughts like that lead only one place, and Dean doesn’t want to go there. He opens the fridge back up and takes out another beer, uses the counter to pop off the cap. It’s cheap swill and tastes like shit, but it’s better than letting his thoughts run free.

He carries it and the pizza back into the main office, where the computer’s waiting for him. He pulls up a porn site and clicks around with the sound off, not really interested in anything he sees. Eventually, he shuts the computer back down again.

Through the glass door, he can see the dark parking lot, empty but for the Impala and a battered hatchback that must belong to whoever came in while Dean was sleeping. He hasn’t seen them yet, doesn’t even know if they’re a man or a woman. He hopes they’ll stay a few more nights; The Winchester could use the money. He doubts it, though. Most people who come through here stay one night tops. Sometimes even less than that.

The heater switches on with a clang, and Dean yawns. He’s got a long night ahead of him.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Enter Castiel

Dean hates cigarettes. Hates the way the smell, the way they taste. Hates the way they remind him of his childhood cooped up in Winchester motel rooms when a smoking guest had already been there. And yet he smokes them in a relentless chain, smoke filling his lungs until they ache. 

It’s nighttime, and the neon-red light from the MOTEL sign splashes over the sidewalk. Dean is on the porch swing again. Seems to him that he spends most of his life out here these days, avoiding the computer screen. He thinks the words are in him somewhere, but right now they’re not coming out to play. 

Or maybe he just doesn’t have another book in him. Maybe he’s run out of words. Can that happen? Can a writer run out of words? The thought spooks him, and he shakes his head.

It hurts, to have these things he wants to say locked up so tight inside. He wishes that he could just sit at his computer and let his fingers go free against the keyboard. But when he does that, all that comes out is nonsense.

Maybe the problem is the book he’s trying to write. What the hell is he thinking, making the protagonist a teenage girl? What the hell does he know about that? 

But Claire. She’s in his head now, and she won’t shut up, no matter how much Dean wishes she would. He can hear her voice, biting and sarcastic, and he wants to get it down on paper. And it’s not just her voice. It’s her emotions, her soul, the way she all wrapped up in a _person_ that Dean can’t let down. Someone has to hear her story, even if it isn’t real.

God, Dean’s being ridiculous. Ever since he was little, the characters in his head always ran the show. He was always going off somewhere to daydream. Down by the creek, or in a motel room, he’d sit with his chin on his hand and dream.

And then he put his dreams down on paper, and he sold them, and it all went pretty well for a while.

Until.

Dean’s mind whites out. No, he doesn’t think about The Thing. He can’t even scoot his thoughts around its circumference without facing it head-on. He keeps it far away from his conscious thoughts, locked up in a box that will never be opened. Hopefully.

The cigarette gives one last flare and gives out; Dean’s smoked it down to the filter. He shoves it back in the carton and rises, stretching his hands over his head. His spine gives a series of extremely satisfying pops. He twists to one side, then the other, before heading into the motel’s main office.

He sits at the empty desk and taps his fingers on the counter. Part of him wants to turn on the NO VACANCIES sign and turn it, but that’s just bad business practice. He can wait for Garth to relieve him. 

Fuck, his life hurts.

The thought pops into his head fully-formed, like Athena springing from Zeus’s skull or some such dumbfuck metaphor. Dean doesn’t want to think about that. Doesn’t want to think about the scars on his wrists, doesn’t want to think about the shitty backwater he’s ended up in, the same backwater that Sam escaped and that Dean never will. Because Sammy has It, that undefinable spark that means he can survive on his own.

And Dean? Dean doesn’t survive. He drowns, continually. 

And now he’s being melodramatic. Perfect. He needs to get his head in order, stat. Or else it’s not gonna be good for him.

The bell on the door tinkles, and a guy Dean doesn’t recognize comes in. He’s hot, that’s the first thing Dean clocks. Crinkly, serious eyes. Soft-looking lips. Looks kind of like a heartthrob, in a scrungy way. The guy’s trenchcoat is in stained tatters, and mud splatters his boots. 

“Just get back from burying a body?” Dean says. 

The man frowns like he’s never heard a friggin’ joke before. 

“I don’t—ah.” He smiles indulgently. “I suppose I do look a mess.” His voice is deeper, deeper than Dean would have expected for some reason. He looks like he should have a gentle voice, to go with his strangely gentle demeanor. But, no, the dude’s got gravel in his throat. And damn if Dean doesn’t like that.

“Well.” Dean leans back in his chair, laces his fingers behind his head. His jacket sleeves slide down, and he immediately puts his hands on his lap. “What can I do you for?”

“Another night,” the man explains, putting his key down on the counter. It’s attached to a block of wood like all the keys in the Winchester.

Dean takes it, clocks the room number. He taps on the computer, opens the spreadsheet. “You Castiel?” He sounds the name out slowly, really dragging it out. “Weird name.”

“I hadn’t noticed.”

They look at each other for a moment, neither of them smiling. Dean breaks first.

“Yeah, whatever.” He chuckles softly as he takes Castiel’s card, runs it through the machine. Declined. “You got another?”

A wrinkle forms between Castiel’s dark brows. “Um.” He digs around in his pockets, comes up with an American Express. “Try this.”

This time, it works. Dean doesn’t ask. He knows that most of the people passing through here aren’t exactly doing their best. The receipt prints in bursts, and Dean rips it off before it’s finished. “Shit. Sorry, man.”

Castiel waves this away. “It’s fine. I don’t need proof of purchase.” 

Dean shrugs and balls up the receipt, tosses it into the wastepaper basket at his feet. “Your loss.”

“I suppose.” Castiel turns to go, but stops at the threshold. “Is that a coffee maker?”

“Free with the room,” Dean agrees. Castiel stalks over and starts it up. Dean watches as hot water trickles into Castiel’s Styrofoam cup. There’s something about the man that’s off, but Dean can’t quite place it. It’s like there’s a wall between the two of them, a wall Dean has no interest in breaching. Part of the motel business means watching weirdos come and go. Hell, Dean’s been the weirdo before. He’s been in plenty of motels across the country, courtesy his shitty-ass book tour.

For some reason, Dean wants to see Castiel’s reaction to the coffee. He watches as he takes a sip, swallows.

“Ah,” Castiel says. He takes another sip. “Hm.” 

Dean grins. “I know, right? Not exactly top-shelf stuff.”

“No, no.” Castiel is clearly trying to smooth out his face. “It’s…good.” 

“You don’t gotta lie, man,” Dean says easily. “It is what it is.”

With a nod, Castiel leaves with his cup clutched in one hand. Dean guesses Castiel isn’t exactly the chatty type.

With nothing much else to do, Dean opens up a word document. He scrolls through the words until they blur together. It’s not much, just scraps of ideas all tossed together, but he hopes that one day… Well. Maybe it’s best not to hope. Dean’s learned that the hard way.

It’s just so fucking frustrating to know that he has all these words inside him, words that feel like they’ll never see the light of day. He thinks and he thinks and he thinks, and then all those thoughts turn into a pile of shitty words that don’t amount to anything. He hasn’t finished a project in years, and the thought hurts. He doesn’t even know who he is when he’s not creating. Used to be, he could sit down with a notebook and a pencil and just go off in his own little world. 

Now? Now he’s lucky if he gets a paragraph in before hitting delete. Maybe he should ban the delete key. Heh.

The bell tinkles again, and Castiel reenters. “More coffee,” he mutters, bringing his cup back to the machine. Dean watches with an amused tilt to his lips.

“You got something to do tonight?”

Castiel flinches, and Dean raises a brow. Damn, maybe the man really did get back from burying a body. Not that that’s Dean’s business. Still, he’s got people to look after. Can’t have a murderer on the loose.

Not that Castiel really gives him murderer vibes. Honestly, he’s got much more of a disheveled detective thing going on. Dean can sort of see him in a movie or something, sitting at a paper-strewn desk in a dark office, slugging back whiskey. 

Whiskey. Now there’s a good idea. Dean can almost feel the burn on his lips. As soon as Castiel leaves, he’ll head back to the kitchen and pour himself a tumbler. He deserves it, with the day he had. Not that today was anything out of the ordinary, but that’s kind of the point. Each day that passes is just as shitty as the one before it. Dean’s honestly getting pretty sick of it, to be honest.

This cup, Castiel drinks all at once. Positively pours it back, like it’s not scalding hot. Dean watches, impressed.

“Never even came up for air,” he comments when Castiel finishes. Castiel shoots him a wry smile.

“I like my caffeine,” he says, pouring himself a third cup. This one, he takes back out, leaving Dean alone. Dean watches him walk away through the glass door and shakes his head. Yep, he knew right away that that guy was an odd bird.

Now, whiskey. Dean gets up from his seat and heads into the kitchen. The whiskey is right in the cabinet where he left it. He pours himself two fingers, deliberates, adds a third. And, yes, it burns deliciously going down. He sighs and wipes the back of his mouth. Already, the world is warming up. He’s not drunk, not anywhere near it, but even a sip of alcohol is enough to make the ever-present panic in his gut die down. The thing is, he could be drunk if he wanted to be, and that’s all the really matters.

He pours himself another drink and downs this one, too. Then a third. Now, all right, maybe he’s a little drunk. He shuffles back to the front desk and reopens the word document. “Words, words, words,” he mutters, because maybe he has a little class. He didn’t learn absolutely nothing in school. Sure, he was no Sammy-level genius, but he did all right. When he wasn’t kept home by John to help out with the family business. Shit, Dean’s clocked so many hours into this place it’s practically criminal. 

When Garth finally arrives, Dean heads back to his motel room. He stops when he sees Castiel sitting on the same bench that Dean was sitting on earlier. His head is tilted back. He’s watching the stars, Dean realizes. He’s sitting so stilly that Dean would hate to interrupt him, so he just pads by, not even offering a word of greeting.

The room’s just as messy as Dean left it. He throws himself down on the bed and lights up, taking long, smoky sucks from the cancer stick. The smoke swirls around his head, gets caught up in the draft from the ceiling fan, disperses. He watches it idly, a grimace plastered to his face. God, he feels like shit right now, and there’s not a damn thing to be done about it. 

_I hate my life_ , Dean thinks, and he doesn’t even try to argue himself out of it. The time for self-denial has long since past. No, Dean just has to accept what his life is now. A long road of nothing, leading to nowhere. Perfect for a guy who runs a motel, right?

Dean’s phone chimes, and he grabs it from his pocket. It’s Jo, telling him that she’s coming over tomorrow with a story for him to look at. Despite himself, he smiles. He hopes that Jo has the career that he’ll never have. He wishes all the good things on her. 

Maybe for her, they’ll come true.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You know when life sucks and you hate everything and you can't write so you open a document and pour out all the fanfiction you can and hope it goes well? Yeah

**Author's Note:**

> Come join me on [tumblr](https://fictionista654.tumblr.com/)!


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